Method Acting
by Kristen999
Summary: Nick doesn't know what true tenacity is, until he returns to work. One Shot post GD challenge.


"Method Acting" (1/1)  
By: Kristen999  
Rating: R  
Spoilers: "Grave Danger"  
Summary: Nick doesn't know what true tenacity is, until he returns to work. (One Shot)  
Notes: Written for The Only Nicky Community Challenge. Exact prompts at the end.

Thanks to Beth for her kind and swift beta.

* * *

The walls are not the first thing he notices back at the Lab; he doesn't measure the distance between tiled floors, or count how many cubicles and rooms are aligned like honeycomb in a bee hive. The Plexiglas everywhere doesn't make him recoil or stare through it expecting to find the other side filled with packed earth. He isn't forced to stare mindlessly at his reflection in the smooth plastic, but sometimes, when he's barely aware of it, he splays out all five fingers against the surface, making a squeaking sound as his hand slides down.

He licks lips that are no longer cracked or split, not with all the Chapstick with extra moisture applied in layers every day. But he is aware of every single eye on him.

Browns, blues, greens, the irises of his co-workers studying him when they think he's unaware. He looks behind his back and their noses are buried in paperwork or they're chatting with someone else. For a moment, he thinks he's just being paranoid, but can't ignore every nervous smile he receives when he stares.

He sits on a stool, scribbling notes about the white cat hair left on a suspect's polyester black blazer. It's of the Persian variety, which by nature is attracted to darker colors just so the animal can alert the world to the ownership of its human. He peers though his microscope, closing his left eye, head going down to align his sight with his right. In his peripheral vision he can see the tiny red blinking light.

The vertebrae in his neck pop when he jerks up, his chest crushing in his lungs in that sick, familiar tightening sensation.

He bolts up when he sees it. A sudden reflexive action, and feelings of anger and stupidity like cold and hot air slam against one another. He makes sure that he didn't bust up the lab's very expensive equipment. The lens of his microscope morphs into a peephole and for a split second he doesn't dare look in it.

He stays in his seat; his head rotating like an owl to see just who else is around.

They all are. Techs pass by in the corridor and other employees look up from their business at the lunatic freaking out over animal hair.

He balls his sweaty palms, but he can't get all the people staring at him to turn away.

To. Stop. Watching. Him.

He's suddenly hot, mouth opening to gulp down stale dry air, and he sheds his baby blue lab coat as he swiftly finds a water fountain. He slurps down greedily at the stream, each mouthful a prized joy of liquid refreshment. He has never taken drinking for granted again.

The loud drum in his ears slows down and he splashes some of the cold wetness over cheeks that might not be too bad a shade of pink. He doesn't even flinch when Grissom is suddenly next to him, but the man is ever the sphinx.

"I want to work down the hall, in another room."

"Okay."

Grissom doesn't ask anything of him and he wanders back and gathers his evidence. When he unplugs the microscope and wraps the cord up, he turns to see Grissom still in the hallway. He can see the older man through those panes of Plexiglas and resists laying his hand over the window in some morbid impulse. He decides then and there that he won't be helping out Archie in the AV room anytime soon. Security surveillance has always been a constant at work, but it's just a little too stifling to have another stupid light staring down at him.

Cameras have become a thing to avoid.

He brushes by a man heading in his direction and doesn't pay the individual much mind, noting his visitor badge as he walks on by.

* * *

"You should come out with us to the Velvet Room."

"Not really interested in bein' a third wheel," he replies, sipping on iced tea.

"It's a group of us, not a date type situation."

He shakes his head, though he knows his friend is just trying.

"Then why not ask out that cute receptionist you've tried flirting with?"

He cocks his head to the side. "I've talked to her like... three times, dude."

Greg's acting all cool in the blistering sun, dark shades concealing his face, but his voice is rich with amusement and his spiky hair bobs when he talks so animatedly. "You do get doe eyed around her, Nick."

"You comparin' me to a female deer?" He shakes his head at his buddy's boldness, but wonders if he's such an easy read. Then squashes any further analysis like that for another time.

Greg pours another glass from a frosty pitcher of some fancy brew, snickering a little. "You get the biggest grin on your face."

"No, I don't," he mutters.

"Do sooooo."

He rolls his eyes. "Not lookin' to hook up with anyone."

"What about Catherine or Mandy?"

"Don't wanna go to a club."

He can hear the low growl of frustration as Greg searches for another excuse or coaxing technique, but nothing will work. He'll shoot them all down, but will save his pal the trouble. "I don't feel like dancin'."

"Yeah, well I've seen your moves, but it's not that type of place. It's very chill- cool new lounge, with some hot chicks. Good ---"

Greg's cut off by his automatic hand silencing anymore four-star reviews. "I'm not much into goin' out yet."

There he said it. Time to move on.

Small talk slips out of their fingers and he wipes beads of condensation across the heated skin of his forehead with his glass.

"We could sit inside where it's cooler."

His fingers are entwined in the tail of his green shirt, twisting the fabric into a knot while it plasters to his back with sweat like plastic wrap. He'd never stopped wearing the long sleeves to cover skin marred by hundreds of irritated swollen patches and what was scarier were the parts of his flesh affected that no one would ever know about. Even during a typical hot spell, he can't bear to wear anything else.

His cell phone's shrilling breaks another uncomfortable silence, and he takes a look at the caller ID and wants to break the phone into shattered pieces. The ringing stops quickly as it goes straight to voice mail.

Again.

Greg doesn't even try to hide his curiosity. "Someone you're avoiding?"

"No one," he lies.

He knows it. Greg does too, but another one of his little rules is that not everyone was on a need to know basis about his personal life.

Not ever again.

* * *

He reclines, not because it's his favorite thing to watch football from and it's definitely not because he has to ease his body's weight back just right to keep the springs from popping him back to a sitting position. He likes his sofa all right, with its large plush cushions, worn spots in the foam from many nights sprawled on it while engrossed in the latest documentary on channel 102. But the couch was for entertainment or to pass the time away, zoned out to the plight of some penguins or the hunting techniques of African lions. Anything to keep his mind from roaming, thinking, remembering.

The chair's steep enough for him to fall asleep when he's so exhausted he can't keep his eyelids open anymore. It's stylish and comfortable, but most of all, it's not flat. And he isn't horizontal anymore, needing the curved angles and support for a back that still suffers from muscle spasms. Most are phantom pains, but his spine hasn't been the same since.

He can't sleep in his bed. Although a king size, it shrinks to a rectangular six by four and he starts to hyperventilate when his blanket is no longer made of cotton but thin air. He doesn't have to reach his hand out in the dark to verify there's no lid. He hasn't spent time in his bedroom since his third night home and funny how ever since then he thinks of his LaZBoy as the place to sleep, to unwind after chasing the ghosts away with a tiny white pill.

Alone in his town home with the shades drawn and his Glock in the end table drawer, he feels halfway secure. He's not hiding from the outside world; just trying to keep it from invading what shreds of a personal life is left intact. The whole Lab witnessed every moment of his twenty-four hours of hell, but he'll be damned if the public will be privy to anything he suffered through.

There are no more flashing camera bulbs in his face, but that doesn't mean the communication age will just sit back and wait for him to answer his door. One look at his answering machine means he's going to have to change phone numbers, so for now he unplugs the cord from the wall.

He knows the first goal to fully getting over his kidnapping is to sleep like a normal person. That's why the first rule he ever made was that no one was allowed to spend the night at his place. He looks at the disconnected line and knows there's no worry about that either. He'd only scare away any possible dates once he did fall asleep.

* * *

"Nick, you're 5'10."

He was being roped into something, but that's what happens when you walk past a room with a perplexed boss.

"Yeah."

Grissom's all beady-eyed, like a cat prowling through blades of grass at the unaware robin hunting something for its nest. Tugged into one of the evidence rooms, the older man begins sizing him up and his lips curve in amusement at his boss's giddiness. The detective is just missing his pipe, but Warrick is playing the part of Doctor Watson.

"Okay, Warrick, give him the Heimlich."

"Come again?" His partner acts as if he'd just been asked to put money on the Detroit Lions.

"Certainly you're familiar with the procedure."

Warrick's standing next to him as Grissom flips through a notepad full of scribbles.

"Nick's got busted ribs."

"They were bruised," he amends, emphasis on _were._

"I don't need you to actually press on his abdomen, just reach behind as if you were."

There's a light bulb going off in his buddy's head, but so far no one wants to clue in the other investigator in the room.

Warrick gets behind him.

"Our suspect claims he broke our vic's ribs trying to save him from choking. Eisner was four inches taller --"

"--And the bruising pattern would be in the wrong place."

The rumble of Warrick's voice in his left ear isn't unexpected, but a queasy feeling swirls his insides like a choppy sea.

"Exactly."

The taller frame behind him has every muscle in his body strung tight. The presence of another body pressed close to his unravels every nerve ending. The other set of breathing isn't his own and he doesn't know it, but his eyes darken.

No one sees them dilate either, because no one pays attention. There are no shadows ghosting over the overly bright, sterile floor.

Two arms snake around his waist.

"Now you'd push upwards." Grissom's voice comes as if from the end of a long tunnel.

"I know that."

His chest expands, but when a set of locked fists squeeze just a little too much…

It's all about pressure and force and freedom. He takes a step forward but when his movement is impeded, the frayed ends that send all those neuron pulses short circuit and speed up, yet bounce and shatter all at once.

All five fingers curl into a ball and his left elbow jabs at the force that tries to keep him still. He doesn't hear the yelp, or slow when his shoulders slam backwards, shoving his entire body along with them, stopping only when he spins on his heel, ready to smash a fist against that unyielding force.

His wrist hurts and when his eyes adjust from seeing nothing but darkness, his vision fills with Warrick's frantic face, way too close and personal. His punch has been blocked, a dark skinned hand the source of the pain securing his joint, Warrick's other arm trembling from the strain of holding a forearm away from his throat.

Then sounds snaps in and he hears his name ping-ponged back and forth by two insistent voices. Warrick's soft and low. Grissom's loud with sharp tones.

He staggers back as if punched, hands out to show their surrender, but they shake. He notices and so do the other two sets of eyeballs. Warrick has sorry written all over his lips and he can never tell what Grissom is thinking.

He mutters an apology and is out of ear shot before he hears words he's just not in the mood to stand around for. There's not a hole big enough to jump into right now so he settles for the men's room, not caring if either of them could easily follow. Even the cold water splashing on his face doesn't wash away how much he feels like an idiot.

"You okay?"

He doesn't jump; he's still too pissed and mortified for that. He looks in the mirror to see some tech staring back at him.

"Yeah."

"Cuz... well... you don't look---"

"Do you mind?" he snaps. He knows he's being an asshole, but he's not going to spill his guts to someone in the bathroom and especially not to some rookie tech with a badge so shiny and new it sparkles.

He doesn't hear the guy leave and doesn't care. He needs to hit the gym, or go walk a few gazillion miles outside. Most of all he needs to get his shit together and that starts with trying to locate the boundaries of his personal space that seem to have been lost with a lot of other things these days.

* * *

He told Grissom once that people were pigs, and while not trying to insult the animal, he still stands by his assessment. Suspicious circumstances at a frat house during a blow out party meant that Sara and Catherine spent hours upon hours collecting and gathering, coming back smelling like ashtrays. It also translated into sorting through and dusting over two hundred beer bottles and aluminum cans. His was the pile of the remote possibilities; Cath and Sara had the fun of doing the same with the other three hundred or so better options down the hall.

How many times did he sweep away this type of refuse after binges during his wild and crazy days in college? His need to find a place to fit in led him to many seedy corners and wasteful hours of his life.

"Glad I grew up," he mutters to no one, sprinkling dust on a Coors Light can. And got better _taste in brew_, he thought with a wry smile.

"Gives new meaning to ninety-nine beers on the wall, doesn't it?"

He matches an unfamiliar voice to a semi-recognizable face. Damn. It was the guy he'd been a complete ass to a few days ago in the bathroom. What was his name?

The guy seems in his late twenties; short brown styled hair like a model, broad shoulders, not as mousy as some of the techs. Over priced shirt way out of a tech's salary range, like something out of GQ. The man's eyes were covered by thin-rimmed designer glasses, but they were like magnets on him.

"I guess you're right." The corner of his tongue slides across his bottom lip. "Look... Um..." He fumbles for a name.

"Louis Fitzpatrick." Strong, sure-fire grip shakes his firmly.

"Nick."

"I know."

Of course he does, who didn't know? The anger is curtailed for a second as his deeper-rooted manners win out. "Yeah, well. Sorry 'bout the other day."

Fitzpatrick's grin looks like a row of shark's teeth. "It's cool, man. Head's still on my shoulders."

He doesn't feel as guilty anymore, leaning his weight on the table, waiting for whatever the guy came in for.

"Guess being back hasn't been as easy as you thought."

He isn't stunned into silence too easily. He's not sure if his ears register the assiduity of his visitor, but his audience of one is glue on his every move.

"I wouldn't want to come back to work after what that guy did. I mean doesn't it bother you?" Louis the tech, a nameless employee just a few seconds ago, is next to him, like a dog sniffing around for a bone hidden inside the layers of his lab coat.

"Ya know, man, I have a lot of work to do and I'm sure you're supposed to be somewhere else."

He's back to scut work; sprinkling powders, searching for raised bridges on sloppy prints. Mr. Nosy hasn't backed off and now his ire's been raised and he can feel the ropes of muscles tie into multiple knots between his shoulders.

"Are you glad he blew himself up?"

He's never hit a brick wall before, but his brain feels the whiplash effect of bouncing off the inside of his skull only to slam to the other side in slow motion. He smells spicy aftershave and the cotton scent of a store bought new t-shirt.

"Kind of took the easy way out didn't he? Dead instantaneously, doesn't have to face his crimes. You don't get to look him in the eye, or have the pleasure of sitting behind your own glass wall as they stick the needle in him. Watch his heart slow down till it stops. Be in control for once."

Sometimes the mind operates separate of your body as he thinks about grabbing the lapels of this jerk's shirt and throwing him against a wall till the guy's head bounces off it a few times. His arms, legs, and feet stay still. Instead his thought process has fractured, spitting out images of Kelly Gordon's iron mask as her faceless father is strapped to a gurney, little machines droning a flat line. Because Gordon was nothing but a voice; a cold, sinister threat on a tape recorder, the man behind the blazing fucking light illuminating all the dirt surrounding him.

Walter Gordon wasn't the light though; just neon-green tinged darkness.

"Would you ask him why if you had the chance?"

He stands to his full height, some hidden whisper in his head inviting him to pummel all that anger out of his system on a moment like this.

"You making any progress yet?"

Catherine's voice snaps him out of his red-filled haze. The predatory smile is back on the tech's face like he's just figured out some big secret.

"Got to get back to work." The tone is like slippery oil on fish scales.

He blinks and Catherine stares at him and he can't remember what he just said for the past two minutes. He does note that they are indeed alone now and somewhere in his blank out, he has already handed her a report on the first fifty bottles and cans.

"Something on your mind?"

Catherine's a very smart woman- she learned early on not to use a certain phrase and he plasters on a grin. "Nope."

She's not buying it, arms crossing her chest.

"You know anything about that new guy?"

Her face relaxes. "No. Never been introduced." Her brow crinkles. "Why?"

"Nothing."

Catherine takes his report and hustles back to whatever is next on her agenda. He has a long list of things he decides not to think about, because what's that old saying? Don't worry about what you don't have control over.

He tells himself that once a file is closed then the case is as well, but it rings hollow in its logic.

He wants to know why. Is that so goddamn difficult? Is it such a ridiculous need?

Asking the question why had been banished a long time ago, because like other times, his ordeal had nothing to do with him. It was just a case of bad luck. Wrong place at the wrong time. If he wants to get through it, the needing to know gets added to his growing not to do list.

* * *

He unloads the pistol, racking the slide three times, and inspects the chamber and magazine to confirm that it's empty. He points the gun away from his body, at the ground like he has a million times over when cleaning it. The steel feels good in his hands even disassembled and he squeezes the trigger.

He looks up from the bench, the locker room a strange place to take apart his Glock, but it's only a few hours before he has to go out to the firing range.

"Hey." He looks up at that baritone voice, and Warrick leans along the door jam.

"What's up?"

"Nothin' man. I'm pullin' a double and you're here early, so just seein' what's goin' on."

He presses the muzzle into the oak, pushing harder than needed, eyes on Warrick the entire time, voice as casual as talking sports. "Once I re-qualify, I'm done jumping hurdles."

"Back into the frying pan." Warrick's eyes glisten like pools, and he can almost see his hands working in the reflection.

He removes the slide off the weapon and, after fussing with the spring, the barrel falls as well. His gun is now stripped ready to be cleaned and he looks at it with a sense of connection, all the parts laid bare along the bench.

"I'm kind of growing tired of these walls, ya know."

Warrick licks his lips and breaks his death lock stare away from the gun and back at his eyes. "You should take your time, bro. No one's keeping a spreadsheet."

"Just want to do my job."

"And you will."

"Now, Rick. I want to get back today not three or five or how many days after that."

Warrick's not ready to back away from another 'discussion' but he's saved from all that.

"If you think you can sneak away, Rick, think again."

His partner has a very guilty look and turns to face the unamused expression of Jim Brass. The man's wrinkled shirt, loosened tie and conspicuously missing suit jacket speaks more volumes than an even more snarky tone.

"Yeah, I know. Still need to dig up that chainsaw from a few weeks ago used to destroy that fine Corvette to match the marks."

Jim rubs his hand over his eyes, "Well go hop to it. I need my beauty rest more than you."

Warrick doesn't say good-bye and the Captain simply nods at him before he 'encourages' his partner to get a move on.

He goes about his chore and applies solvent to a cleaning rod and begins to work it into the barrel.

When he sees another shadow he shakes his head. "Told ya, man. It's just the last step."

"For what?"

He knows that voice. He rams the brush up and down several times, his eyes as deadly as the metal parts in his hands. "Wasn't talkin' to you."

The cocky lab tech looks behind him, then slowly back at the criminalist. "Then who?"

"Never mind," he mutters, annoyed that he fell for that hook, line, and sinker.

The barrel's now dry from scrubbing it too much; he grabs more solvent to work on the outside muzzle.

"You like carrying a piece?'

His fingers run along the smooth curves of the gun part, every section memorized by touch.

"Have you ever had to use it?"

He shakes his head, though he thought about it once, didn't he?

"What business is it of yours?"

The door closes behind with a click and he swears the guy did it on purpose. He wants to get up, go nose to nose with this ass. He's riled up and the used car salesman's vibe is strong, and vermin gives him less creeps. Or maybe its cuz your radar has been off for a while, Stokes, you idiot. Attracting wackos like there's a neon sign on your back.

He ignores that voice too, but doesn't feel like going all alpha, so, even if his position of power is weakened by sitting, while jerk off relishes in standing next to him...over him, he just cleans his gun, because the Glock's slide under his fingertips gives him a hum of electricity as he takes a rag to it.

"I don't have to carry one, so it just intrigues me that you do. I mean you process scenes, it's like an active lab without the boring decor."

"Then you don't know much."

"Why don't you educate me?"

He is fuming right now and for the life of him he doesn't know why he even lets this dipshit affect him. But he feels like getting into a tussle.

"Cuz crime scenes aren't always cleared. Suspects could be on the premises or come back. Hell, a bystander on a street might get irritated or a drugged out of his mind loony could happen on by. Doesn't matter, because it can be a war zone out there and even though our tools of the trade are the same as a tech's, doesn't mean the environment is as friendly.

"It's a dangerous world to mix it up on the same level as all those predators, and then sometimes you become the prey." Beady eyes look up, framed by a toothy smile. "Don't you."

The lockers' shuddering is loud, but not loud enough to alert anyone that a body had been shoved hard against them. His breaths are hard and fast, the prick's designer glasses fall off balance, ready to drop from the owner's nose. He curls his fingers into the expensive shirt collar even more, pulling forward then slamming broad shoulders back again to drive home a point.

"Who the Hell are you?"

"Told you, Louis Fitzpatrick," and the man's voice never wavers, in fact there's a touch of glee.

"Yeah? I doubt I'll find that name listed on any employee records here."

"Did the gun help you at all inside that coffin? Give you the hope and security it's designed to?"

He is rough when he frisks the guy, yanking out a wallet and flipping though the contents. "Nevada Times. Told you guys 'no comment'."

"You wouldn't return my calls."

He hasn't let go, his nose filling with overpriced cologne. "Takin' it off the hook not enough of a clue?" He won't let go, won't uncurl his hands. "You know the kind of trouble you're in, jackass?"

"I know the type you're in."

He grins. Jerk off grins.

"I'd be happy to demonstrate what real assault is in the parking lot." Anyone else wouldn't recognize him throwing out threats like this.

The reporter doesn't stop smiling. "I'm not worried about _that_. More curious about the little dream world you live in. And that your friends around here have the blinds pulled tighter closed than you do."

"You pretend to be a shrink too? Well I hope it helps you out while you sit behind bars." He finally releases his grip, backing away towards the door. "Goin' to grab a couple uniforms now."

"Might want to tell them something about a lack of security around here. I wandered around all over this place for days. Found lots of interesting stuff."

"Which will be confiscated."

"Will it? Of course that's saying there's anything to be worried about."

He doesn't like being blackmailed; even worse was being blackmailed and unsure about the leverage. "You steal something? Got a hidden camera on you too?"

The reporter smoothes out his lab jacket and fixes his collar, slow and deliberate. "Can't see how you stand wearing such boring garb."

"Everything here is by the book- whatever crap you're trying to sell, won't work."

The reporter removes his overpriced spectacles and slips in them in a shirt pocket. "Fake, thought they made me seem more geeky. And yeah, stuff here's pretty legit, but wouldn't our readers enjoy all the 'tiny' slip-ups, all the personal drama of everyone here. Such a close-knit family. A multi-part expose, with or without video or audio will sell and me sitting in jail only makes it even more legit for a cover up."

He doesn't need this. Doesn't want it! For Pete's sake, all he wants to do is get back to his freaking job.

"What's your game?"

"Do you know what method acting is?"

He doesn't like the sound of this and he looks to the right to see if anyone else is around, but of course the door is closed.

"Something about how actors pretend to be the people they want to be."

"More like replicating the emotions which a person has to portray." Asshole slips his hand through silky dark hair, smoothing it out, in love with himself no doubt. "I do the same when I write. Try to place myself in the other person's shoes."

He feels his stomach drop at the same time his muscles must be doing something to cause all kinds of vertebrae slip and twinge.

"You could NEVER understand." He feels acid reflux on top of a spinning head and he's still backing away, but it doesn't matter because his pal keeps in tandem with every move.

"I'd never presume to, not that stupid. Though, I did find something of interest in one of your lab rooms. All tucked away, tagged to storage, and left to the wayside."

He's done playing games, and despite himself he just stares, uses that interrogation glare.

"If you join me, all I'll do is ask you to take an look and that's it."

"Then you're just going to forget about things?" he gruffs, knowing it's not even in the realm of possibility.

The reporter laughs like a hyena. "No, of course not. I'll write about you as I wanted, but I won't include all my notes on your friends. Be the exclusive I planned all along."

He doesn't have a rule for this, no guideline or principle to follow. He's lost and fucked at the same time. Instead he steps aside reluctantly and the reporter beams.

"I'll be outa of your hair soon."

He isn't sure what it's going to take to make that true.

* * *

It's way after lunch and the Lab doesn't have the hustle and bustle from peak time for Days, and it's too early for anyone he knows to be straggling in. Swing shifters are not even around yet. The halls are quiet and his anger overrides his surprise about how easily the reporter navigates his way around. He wonders where that neat little ID came from, and thinks a bar code of some kind might be order for the future.

They enter one of the rooms away from the garage. It's then he realizes they're going into the Twilight Zone; not the TV show, but one of their pet areas. It has plenty of room to conduct experiments that might get messy or require large amounts of space. It was also something of a junkyard, filled with discarded materials that 'might' come in handy later. Parts, trinkets, tools, and just plain crap lying around. It's right next to a large storage facility for court.  
He follows his escort towards a corner as he checks behind him out of habit.

"You just happen to get lost in here one day?" he snaps, still peeved and growing more so by the minute.

Fitzpatrick turns around, legs still moving towards his goal. "Like I said, Mr. Stokes. This place became easy picking's once I got the lay of the land."

"You give tabloids a bad name- do you even have any ethics?"

The laughter again is sandpaper in his ears and he is ready to silence it, but the weasel finds what he was looking for under a tarp. "Know what's in this crate?"

"Your morals?"

"Pieces of your soul."

His stomach dropping then twisting up in knots did little in the area of his voice. It disappears along with his snappy comebacks and flippancy. His right hand sufferers a little tremble, his eyes hollow upon some crate.

He hates surprises, can't take any unknowns connected with that night. The sound of air caught in his throat is pathetic, especially when those daggers for eyes are aimed at him, digging, twisting for more. Eyes memorizing all of this for some little play, pulling strings like a puppet master.

He shouldn't be doing this, but he feels compelled to lower to his haunches to see what's inside. The container could hold a bicycle, drum can, a TV, hell, anything. He's squatting, nothing but that damn little nervous tic in his hand, one which is held still when a colder one forces it to push open the lid.

"Got to stop hiding."

The crate is filled with pieces of broken, burnt plastic. Some sharp and ragged. A lot of fragments are melted into little clumps like a crazy art project gone wrong. He grabs a piece the size of his hand, the surface still so smooth and abnormally curved from heat. It was once clear, see-through, now tinged black.

It's thicker than he'd ever imagined, though that makes sense. The box had to withstand the weight, but the pressure? Snap, crackle, pop and a web of lines had spread like growing veins and all the while he just prayed for it to hold together. His finger rubs over the sharp edge of a larger shard, bigger than his arm, and the stench of fire and rotted earth clings to every scrap.

"Hard to imagine this was once big enough to hold you prisoner. When did you give up? I mean, eventually it was bound to happen."

"This isn't it." His voice is razor sharp.

"Yes, it is. Only thirty or forty pounds of debris, some of it evaporated or the fragments got blown all over that nursery. A lot of plastic dust too; bet it made great fertilizer."

He's shaking his head, gnawing away at his poor lip now, so hard to keep the anger at bay. The rage.

"This... This is...was evidence. Tagged and stored somewhere."

"You don't know? It was pulled out recently, never did find out why. Maybe routine perhaps?"

All kinds of springs are stretched way past their limit: bend, break, or let go. Not many choices left.

"Hard to imagine that the whole time you wanted out would have been a death sentence for you and anyone else. Think you might have used that gun if you'd known about the explosives before hand?"

Breaking, breaking, breaking.

"Tell me, Nick. Tell me what it was really like all alone in there. What must have been going on inside that mind of yours…? Take me back there."

He throws the Plexiglas back inside and kicks the crate away.

"Go to Hell," he seethes.

"I'm trying to know what it's like to go and come back." Fitzpatrick doesn't need scales to slither like a snake. "Your eyes, they tell me a lot. But, what would really give me the real deal is if you were able to see things through Gordon's eyes."

"What?" It was supposed to be _Fuck You! _Or... something like that. But he's having a hard time focusing now.

"The prototype. I mean, you do know that they kept it right? Wouldn't it be interesting to see it now? To be standing outside and looking in?"

It's like a bad dream, one second eager hands are wrestling with the tarp that's covering much more than just a crate or two and then it gets all kinds of crazy.

"What's going on here?'

Jim Brass looks like something the cat dragged in with his disheveled appearance but he's thinking the detective stepped out of a poorly budgeted C grade horror flick. Jim's just as grumpy looking as before, but holding a chainsaw in just enough of a threatening manner that all the bravado from the reporter has evaporated.

"We're just goin over some old case---"

"Shut up."

Jim advances, whether he realizes he's acting like a really deranged lunatic or not with that deadly tool in his hands, but he doubts the captain cares one bit.

"Who are you?" Brass is looking between both men and he knows something's not quite right with the picture before him.

"I'm Louis Fi---"

"Yeah? If that's the case, bud, what are you doing in this room, messing with shit that's got nothin' to do with ya?"

He is torn between anger, embarrassment, and that gnawing anxiety of what was about to happen, so he feels rendered useless.

"We--"

Jim is inches from the reporter sporting a days worth of beard, antiperspirant that's run out, and the fire of a frayed temper ready to let loose.

"First of all, you don't get to talk, because I may be old, but I'm not deaf."

He steps way from the crate and is next to Jim, pleased at the change in events regardless of his feelings because anything is better than what he was being forced to face. Looks like the all-knowing reporter is shaking in his shoes because those beady eyes keep going back and forth between the chain saw and the Captain.

"You think you can come in here and threaten one of this lab's employees? How much evidence have you contaminated with your filthy hands?"

"The public has the right to know about the---- "

"You even stop long enough to get your head out of your ass to realize how many criminals might be given walking papers because of your need to be the biggest asshat! I'm going to have you up on trespassing, fraud, tampering with evidence." Jim catches his breath, "Wonder how many unpaid tickets you have outstanding."

"My paper's legal team doesn't scare--"

"Who says you'll see them any time soon?" Jim is the one pressing forward while the reporter is being forced back.

The two rams lock horns, but only one of them has a set of real balls and soon the reporter is ripped to shreds as Jim Brass lets him have it, the two of them already at the other side of the room as the Captain stalks the weasel into another corner. He doesn't have time to feel the relief or even glee as the laws of _Jersey Justice_ is discussed. No, he feels frozen by the siren song of a very deadly curiosity.

A prototype… of course the Team had had one…needed one to test things like his air supply levels and ways he was kept alive. It really was just some sick, evil experiment. Each step flawlessly tested, dead dogs killed in the hands of the merciless shadow of Gordon. How many hours were spent planning away? How many different ways did Walter Gordon think of before coming to terms with burying someone alive? When did it hit him that indeed it was the cruelest of punishments, while giving him the ultimate control over everything?

He tugs at the tarp, pulls hard until the rest of it unveils the human torture chamber and he can't believe his eyes... Can barely breathe at all to see exactly how small it is, how clinically deadly and sadistic. He's sure Walter Gordon was proud of his accomplishment.

He doesn't exactly jump; flinch, yes, when a hand touches his shoulder. He is glad that Jim doesn't react, but stares at the prototype with less enthusiasm. "Ain't going to pretend to know what's going inside your head now, but whatever it is, just leave it alone, Nicky."

"Where's Clark Kent?"

"Now don't insult a good guy, but Sam came by while you were day dreaming. Asshole's going to chill out in the drunk tank for a while."

He smiles slightly. "Really."

"Call it lost in the system; happens all the time."

"Look, Jim... this dude's been hanging around. I dunno what he's got but it could hurt--"

"Nick, it's taken care of. Guy's not going to type one word about anything. We're just making sure the message is crystal clear during his remaining stay with us, got it?"

He nods his head, and eyes the chainsaw. "That your evidence in your current case?"

Jim looks down at the deadly menace with a wry grin. "Yeah, now I know why that Jason fellow got such a kick scaring people with it."

"Wish I could borrow it for a minute or two," and he stares at the Plexiglas coffin with a new reason.

"It's a symbol for why you're here. In a strange way, that thing saved you."

He wants to break it, like he's been broken, but knows the pearls of wisdom of his friend. Hodges found the Semtex on this thing and in the end, that saved them all that night. His friends working together did. He's the one outside this time...in control.

"Come on, I need another bad cup of coffee." Jim nudges him along.

He walks away from it...and as he abandons the urge to destroy the box, he realizes he leaves behind some feelings of destruction altogether. Maybe the reporter did teach him one thing. Facing his problems head on instead of fearing them, in the long run, would get him over this hump in the road. He walks out of the Twilight Zone room, knowing that his mental list for getting better will only grow smaller the more he crossed items off of it, instead of adding more.

* * *

Pruehall's Challenge. Okay this one is so not my fault. I blame Dr. Robbins in "Living Legends" for this.

It is now cannon the press and paparazzi can, and will, sneak into the lab to get a story. So the challenge is…

When coming back to work after the events of Grave Danger Nick has to deal with more than after-effects of his kidnapping – he also has to deal with a very determined, and bothersome, member of the press. Nick does however have some unexpected help from one of the members of the lab.


End file.
